Milwaukee Digital Refractometer

Zacco · Mar 16, 2014

Smh........................

The Flying Turkey · Mar 16, 2014

Zacco said:
Smh........................

Shake your head?

You're the one on here having an argument with the way the manufacturer calibrates it's instrument. A instrument that you don't own.

If you don't like the instrument, that's fine. But why go on this thread and argue with me about what the manufacturer says is the proper way to calibrate their equipment?

I think you just want to hear yourself type and argue with someone.

Zacco · Mar 16, 2014

I have no doubt that Milwaukee tell's you to use DI to calibrate your meter. What I am saying is there are too many variables in an unknown solution (DI) to calibrate a refractometer accurately . If im shooting for 35ppt in my tanks, then why on earth would I buy a refractometer that will only calibrate to o ppt? Enjoy your refractometer and have a nice day sir. Im closed to this thread.

Daniel@R2R · Mar 16, 2014

I have one and love it. You do have to use RODI or distilled water for calibration to 0. Then I'm sure you could check calibration using calibration solution if you want to. These devices are shown to be reliable, though...so I wouldn't worry. I would use calibration solution on a manual (regular?) refractometer...but this thing is digital and generally spot-on.

SnoQ · Mar 16, 2014

I have the MA887 and use distilled water. Works great and is simple to use.

ihavecrabs · Dec 15, 2016

Zacco said:
Are you sure your RO RO/DI has no trace salt content in it? How many stage is the RO/DI unit? How exhausted are the membranes? What is the TDS reading? When you calibrate using o as your base, you are way too far away from your testing scale for all kinds of anomalies. This is why I kinda don't understand why electronic refractometers (Milwaukee) dont have an option to calibrate to anything but 1.000, or ro/di. There is no way to calibrate it to 1.025. Does'nt make much sense to me. If a refractometer has a deviation or margin of error of 1% per .001, that means that if you calibrate it to 1.000 with DI Water, that reading 1.025 might be as much as 25% off. Granted, this is a highly exaggerated situation for the purposes of explanation. That's why I only use a "Dial" in meter. I can take a know calibration solution of 1.025 and know my meter is dead on.

Milwaukee provides steam distilled water for 0.00 calibration and a 1.025 sample for validation of calibration. I think they are 100% on their game. Maybe back in March they didn't supply these solutions with the instrument?

tankstudy · Dec 15, 2016

ihavecrabs said:
Milwaukee provides steam distilled water for 0.00 calibration and a 1.025 sample for validation of calibration. I think they are 100% on their game. Maybe back in March they didn't supply these solutions with the instrument?

The newer models and etc come with the 0.00 and 1.025 control samples. Older productions of the products did not. I recently purchased another digital refractometer and noticed the controls were provided. I found this to be pretty awesome.

maidia · Dec 15, 2016

tankstudy said:
The newer models and etc come with the 0.00 and 1.025 control samples. Older productions of the products did not. I recently purchased another digital refractometer and noticed the controls were provided. I found this to be pretty awesome.

Good to know...I may buy one soon...Thanks